


A moment, then a million years

by Stoic_fire1955



Category: Sen Çal Kapımı (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-12 20:21:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29640141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stoic_fire1955/pseuds/Stoic_fire1955
Summary: and what came out - what came out was something less
Relationships: Serkan Bolat/Eda Yildiz
Comments: 20
Kudos: 64





	1. Of seconds that hold eternity

Eda felt her heartbeat pound strangely in her ear, the sound a frenzied drumroll accompanying her racing thoughts. 

“-I’m sick of this, I’m sick and tired of you! Eda this, Eda that, it’s always about you goddamnit!” - a sob tore through Ceren, breaking her words briefly - “You never, never think about anyone else do you? It’s always your problems, your love, you, you, you. Who cares if you break some hearts on the way, who cares if someone else never sees the light, who cares!!”

Eda watched, silent, in some pocket of deceptive stillness as chaos ravaged the world around her. She could feel her hands begin their featherlight trembles and felt shallow breaths flutter through her chest, edges of her vision blurring ever so slightly even as she felt things grow so clear in those passing seconds. 

In that heavy silence between words, Ceren let her last remark fall like lead, heavy in spite of the way she whispered it. “You make me sick Eda Yildiz, you make me sick to my stomach, and I hope to god I never see you again.”

Ceren turned away from her friend, shoving the chairs in her path, and slammed the door as she left the Yildiz home - _her second home, her childhood, her beautiful, perfect, greedy best friend_ \- left it all behind her. Unknowing or uncaring, that as she left, she ripped something else away in her fury. Something fragile and desperate that held together the last vestiges of a woman near some great fall. 

Eda let her hands inch behind her to the wall and let herself slip to the ground. With her head tilted down and back bowed, she let out a sharp laugh, lined with bitterness and heartbreak, sharpened by disbelief and let the numbness she had been holding at bay for the last few months break in waves over her tired mind. 

She wondered, inanely, if there should be some chorus of applause or a grand finish to this hellish day. It would be fitting, she supposed, if the world really had revolved around her. Her head lolled back to the wall and she let her eyes fall shut, scenes of the day whipping past her mind like some demented movie sped up. 

-Serkan, eyes cold and heart some million years away from her own, _“Listen, Eda, you may have been someone in my past, I won’t deny that. But now, now I’m not the same person. There is no room in my life for you, and there never will be. All I ask is you to move on, and let me do the same with Selin. Just move on Eda, what’s done is done.”_ Just move on Eda. What’s done is done, 

_-“You make me sick Eda Yildiz, you make me sick to my stomach”_ You make me sick, so sick, 

_-”Eda, love, I-I don’t feel too well” - “Hala, hala, wake up, you’re scaring me wake up…” -”I’m afraid, Ms.Yildiz, that your aunt has progressed to a serious stage -” - “months, if we’re optimistic, but it’s too early to say for certain.. '' months,_ months only months, not her hala, she can’t lose her she can’t she can’tshecan’t - 

And in that sliver of a moment, Eda felt some keening desperate creature in her heart finally give up, finally die. Even as tears rolled down chilled cheeks, a blankness crept over her mind, beautifully numb, beautifully impervious to the world around her. 

And Eda Yildiz, with her heart on her sleeve, eyes full of hope, and unquenchable love, stepped into some great void, and what came out - what came out was something less - with jagged edges and cracked skin, and cold, cold eyes - what came out would drag what’s left of her crumbling family to shore, _Melo, her Hala, her beautiful Hala_ …, and if a few others drown on the way - well then - so be it.


	2. Mountains of sorrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“There are mountains of sorrow that cannot move, and one way or another, we will all kneel there.” - BJ Miller_

Eda, fingers clawing the cold, sterile sheets, watched her Hala breathe, her eyes following the slow rise and fall of the frail chest. Slumped forward on the hard plastic chair and with blaring fluorescent lights glaring down at her, Eda desperately tried to feed the tiny spark of hope flickering within her. 

“You’ll be fine Hala, everything will be ok, tamam? - just hold on, alright? Hold on, we’ll get through this, we’ll- “ a trembling breath tore up her throat and Eda let her head fall forward, tangled strands of hair brushing her hollowed cheeks. 

Another breath, all the more agonizing for the effort it cost her, shuddered through her body and Eda made her promise once more; to her Hala, or to the damned world, she didn’t know. 

“We’ll get through this, I swear we will - whatever it takes - whatever the hell it takes.”

And she meant it too, whatever it took, Eda was willing to do it all if she could save her Hala. 

That promise had led her, stripped of her pride, to kneel at her Babaanne’s feet, doing the one thing she had sworn she would never succumb to, and grovelled to the woman who had nearly destroyed her mother, who hated her lowborn roots (the very ones Eda would die before refusing), for help. 

Not too long ago, such an act would have burned Eda from the inside out, tearing down all that she stood for, shaming all the sacrifices her Anne and her Hala had made, but now - now Eda had pitifully little in this world. And for those she had left, _Hala, her Hala_ , she would rip her soul to shreds if need be - what care did she have for something as petty as pride?

The state-of-the-art equipment, the best that filthy rich money could buy, whirled and beeped around her. The room, for all its lack of soul and painful sterility, would give her Hala her life and her health, _or so help her _\- but no - Eda refused to stray down that path.__

__To hold at bay that ever encroaching wave of despair and _hatred and bitterness and defeat_ , things had to get better - they had to._ _

__\--------_ _

__Sprawled on the sofa, eyes lidded, Eda watched the stately woman, still fiercely beautiful for all that she’s aged, softly tap the wooden desk with gloved fingers._ _

__“You’ve come to me for help, child, and I gave it.”_ _

__Eda let her eyes trace the elegant white hair, pale curls giving the odd impression of a soft wooly lamb, before dropping them to meet the sharp angled eyes of her Babaanne, almost glowing in the fireplace light._ _

__No, this was no lamb, no innocent little old woman at all- this was a predator with its prey close at hand, batting it to and fro before lunging for the kill. She remained silent, almost insolent in the way she still gazed at the elder woman, posture defiantly slumped._ _

__“I gave you my help, and even though you may detest me, I am still your grandmother. Still the head of this family, and you - no matter your birth - still belong to the Yildrim lineage - ”_ _

__Her Babannaee gave no pause at the scoff that broke her words and continued, soft polished tones at odds with her next words,_ _

__“Your filth of a mother and my fool of a son may have cast away this family, but the Yildrim name isn’t a coat to take off and put on as you please - you live, breathe and die by the family._ _

__You’ve asked for my help, and I’ve given it. The protection and the well-being of your Hala is given to the daughter of Yildrim - not to Eda Yildiz, a flower girl off the streets.” Tawny eyes watched the young woman sprawled on the sofa, words hanging in the air, their finality unmistakeable. “I expect you know what that means child.”_ _

__Eda knew all too well what that meant, just as her Hala and Anne had known twenty-five years back. To be born a Yildrim is to die a Yildrim, come hell or highwater._ _

__Eda felt those invisible manacles she had so desperately railed against all her life, finally clamping around her, dragging her slowly but inevitably towards blood-ridden wealth and cold aristocracy, the one thing her Anne had fought tooth and nail to set her free from._ _

__But Eda would do anything to save her Hala, and if that meant kneeling to the whims of this accursed family, she would do it. She would do it all._ _


	3. Fleeting hues of gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _In that sliver of a second between joy and grief, remember one thing, sweet child of summer. “Nothing gold can stay”_
> 
> _“Nothing gold can stay” - Robert Greene_

Heart in her throat, blood pounding in her ears, Melo knelt amidst the frenzy of red and gold leaves that swirled in the Yildiz garden. Her breath a fine mist by her trembling mouth, Melo could only repeat those useless, helpless words again and again; 

“No, no, please, Dada, why, whywhywhy”

The solemn statues of stone eyes and stone hearts, price tags fluttering against the wind watched, silent, uncaring of the broken woman that lay by their feet. 

Cradled in her hand, ever so gently, despite the growing hatred she felt at its presence, sat a slip of a photo, and just between those clenched fingers could be seen two smiling children. One with beautiful doe eyes and dimples stretched wide, and another with a smile that beamed unreservedly out of her soft cheeks. 

At the bottom, scrawled in that looping, twirling script Melo had always admired, were the words; _“I’m sorry, I have to go”_.

To the world at large, that meant a pitiful little, yet to Melo - Melo who had grown beside her doe-eyed girl, through years of joy and grief and pain alike, felt their meaning drop hard in her chest, the memory of when she had last heard those words ringing in her head;

“Melo, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I have to go - I’ll be back - I have to go -”

In that darkness of winter, those words had been thrown, desperate and barely audible, by a child, unwilling and pleading even as she tried to reassure her friend crying helplessly by the door. 

Men in suits, and women with soft mouths and kind words, _and cold cold eyes_ , stood watch as the child was dragged into the flurry of cars, and Hala - Hala was screaming, then pleading, and then that damning silence - Melo remembered it all. 

Oh her Dada had returned, of that she was grateful, although withdrawn and eyes hollow, she had returned hand in hand with Hala. And Melo had scrambled up, questions ready to tumble out from her lips, and had seen, for the first and last time, a stranger that wore her Hala’s face.

Where that gentle kindness and soft smile had always found their home, this Hala had something alien _hatredburninghatred_ in her face, some raw, seething rage that seemed to young Melo, had finally driven off those demons of that night. 

Under warm covers, legs pressed against her Dada’s, Melo had learnt for the first time the shadows that clung to the Yildiz _YildrimYildrimYildrim_ family. With chubby hands firmly grasping her friend’s, Melo had sworn then, with all her childish heart and soul, that she would never let Eda go again, _never again would she let her Dada’s eyes dim like they did on that day_.

Now, crumpled on the pavement, the cold of the wind seemingly seeping into her entire being, Melo knew she had failed. She knew Hala was sick, she knew it and arms cradling her Dada, she had promised to do everything they could to save their Hala. 

What she hadn’t known were the cracks making their way through her friend, chipping away at hope and dreams and the belief that things would get better. What she hadn’t known was that the numb, heartbroken look in Eda’s face was not of helpless disbelief, but rather of the cold realization of what had to be done. 

What had to be done to save Hala. What had to be _sacrificed_ to save Hala. 

Knees bruised and fingers cold to the tips, Melo also knew what had to be done. She looked up, Fifi still standing by her side, just as silent as those stone statues that watched it all, and met those dark eyes. They both knew what had to be done. 

Over her dead body will those bastards break her Dada. Over her goddamn body would she let that happen once again.


	4. The loveliest lies of all

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“...Mere echoes of the spring,  
>  But where have we come,  
> And where shall we end?” _
> 
> _-Into the Unknown_
> 
> _Blind eyes and broken mind, do you hear those echoes of spring? Oh how beautiful those lies had drifted in that gentle wind...and how far you’ve wandered since then._

In that brief, hovering stillness between the rush of meetings, Serkan let himself sink into the chair, hands sliding down his face, that strange exhaustion that hounded his heels incessantly these days tugging him once more. 

Almost unwittingly, his eyes rose to the chair across the table, its emptiness a near physical incarnation, snaking its tendrils forward and clawing apart his focus, his energy - his goddamn peace. 

His hand shot out, abrupt and jerky, and the clattering of the paperweight to his right stood as the damning proof of his unravelling control. _Goddamnit, goddamnit -_

Serkan, the man who had always been so in control, so firmly the master of himself, was losing it, losing his mind - all over some - some woman who wasn’t even worth his goddamn memory. 

The love of his life, some innocent flower girl of an angel - he scoffed out loud at that - _the manipulator, the woman who twisted the Serkan of before into a fool, the temptress who seduced and ruined him_ \- 

The words, the conflicting views, they all whirled in and about his head, and the pounding headache that followed brought Serkan to slump heavily against the chair, hands pressed against his temples in a vain attempt to stem it all. 

Yildiz, Eda Yildiz, Eda, Eda, Eda - she refused to get out of his head, refused to leave him alone. How did this woman have such a hold on him when she wasn’t even here, eyes not looking desperately into his own, scent not drowning his surroundings - how could she still be in his head?

She was gone, the crumpled letter on his table the only forewarning of some ridiculous decision to manage her shares from afar, and where exactly she’d gone, the infuriating thing failed to tell him. 

He should be glad, so bloody glad - and wasn’t this precisely what he had asked of her - _“There is no room in my life for you - move on”moveonmoveon_ \- and she had done just that; packed her bags and moved on - 

And he should be so bloody glad, the conwoman was out of his life, he was back in control of his body - _that treacherous thing, always moving towards that woman, always seeking her out in the most unexpected times_ \- and yet glad, and any semblance of peace or happiness was so far off a realm that it was almost funny - 

Except he wasn’t laughing, and he wasn’t smiling - wasn’t sleeping either for that matter, and his own body was in rebellion against him - air was burning through his throat, and his heart ached, and Serkan - Serkan knew, with every fiber of his being, that he hated this woman - hated her for breaking him like this.

And that quiet, stifled part of him he had shoved into the darkest recesses of his scarred mind, whispered the ugly truth amidst those pretty web of lies in his head; 

_He hated Eda Yildiz - but not for the broken man she left behind_

_\- but that she had left him at all._


End file.
